Del. State of Mind: ‘More chickens than people, dude’

Today, the 226th anniversary of Delaware becoming the first state to ratify the U.S. Constitution, Vice President Joe Biden, Joe Flacco, Elena Delle Donne and Wayne and Garth from “Wayne’s World” will come together to celebrate Delaware Day[1].

Wait. What?

Morgan Shank, a seventh-generation Delawarean originally from Dover, is releasing a music video today for a song called “Delaware State of Mind,”[2] a parody of Jay Z’s “Empire State of Mind” shot in towns and cities across the state.

[3]

“On December 7, we started a chain react,” Shank raps on the track.

With a youthful swagger, the 26-year-old Shank name-checks some of Delaware’s best known personalities, opening and ending with the Dela-centric scene in the 1992 comedy with Mike Myers dead-panning, “Imagine being magically whisked away to…Delaware.”

The Odessa resident teamed up with Lewes-based filmmaker Rob Waters and Middletown singer Morgan Burris to create the comedic ode to the First State with Shank rapping lines like, “If our state was a shorty, I be at the waist/Seaford got that donk and Wilmo is the face.”

“I love that Delaware is still undiscovered,” says Shank, noting the state’s tiny population of about 920,000. “There’s a line in the song, ‘Under one million and trying to maintain it,’ because when people start waking up and realizing what the cost of living and property taxes are here, they are going to want to move to Delaware.”

[4]

To that end, the song’s chorus is a Blue Hen tribute that Delaware tourism officials should love:

“Delaware/We were the first state to ratify, tax free leave you satisfied/Now you’re in Delaware/Our flag be waving that buff and blue/More chickens than people, dude/Let’s hear it for Delaware, Delaware, Delaware.”

After getting a sneak preview of the video this week, Gov. Jack Markell reacted by telling The News Journal, “As an amateur poet myself, I admire anyone who can rhyme ‘ratify’ with ‘satisfy’ and ‘incorporate’ with ‘reverberate.’”

Shank will be at the Deer Park Tavern[5] in Newark Saturday at 9:30 p.m. for the video’s upstate debut. It was also released online at 12:07 a.m. today as a nod to Dec. 7, also known as Delaware Day within our borders.

A screening of “Delaware State of Mind” was held last week at Rehoboth Beach’s Big Chill Surf Cantina[6]. Casey Minard, Big Chill’s general manager, saw it for the first time with the 150-person, standing room-only crowd.

Even though it’s a parody of Jay Z’s New York love letter, don’t worry, Delawareans. The only New York moment in the video comes when Shank is standing underneath the Caesar Rodney statue in Wilmington’s Rodney Square, singing, “I ain’t rockin’ Yankee gear/Get that stank up outta here!”

It was April when Shank, a hip-hop fan who has never done a professional project like this before, turned to Seaford native Hari Cameron, the chef/owner of Rehoboth Beach restaurant a(MUSE.)[8], for help. Cameron is a former neighbor who got to know Shank during his time working concierge at Rehoboth’s Bellmoor Inn & Spa.

Cameron put Shank in touch with Waters, who has used Cameron’s restaurant as backdrops for his short films, some of which have also included Cameron as one of the actors.

“It’s great when people come together in Delaware for positive reasons,” says Cameron, who is shown joyously popping champagne with Shank under the iconic Dolle’s sign on Rehoboth’s Boardwalk to close out the video.

It was shot over multiple days in May and November with Shank and Waters driving across the state, shooting guerrilla-style at distinctive Small Wonder locations.

[9]

The playful and mostly PG video – be warned, it does include a stray PG-13 word for breasts – includes scenes at Hammerheads restaurant in Dewey Beach, Middletown’s The Everett Theatre, Dover International Speedway and Wilmington’s Frawley Stadium, to name a few.

“It was a lot of work, so I’m excited for people to get to see it,” says Waters, of Bystander Productions[10], who shot both the video and still photography.

The mostly black-and-white video bursts into color for its crescendo as the 17-year-old Burris, a senior at Bear’s Aquinas Academy and Miss Delaware’s Outstanding Teen in 2012, belts out the Alicia Keys-esque chorus while on the University of Delaware campus with her keyboard.

Shank and Burris were put together by a family friend they had in common. “He sent me the lyrics and it was so perfect and so Delaware that it’s not even funny,” Burris says.

So as Delaware celebrates itself today, Shank hopes Delawareans and Delaware natives around the world will get a kick out of his Diamond State tribute.

After all, he says, “It’s an homage to the state that I love.”

IF YOU GOWhat: A screening of Morgan Shank’s “Delaware State of Mind” music videoWhen: Saturday, 9:30Where: The Deer Park Tavern, 108 W. Main St., NewarkCost: Free